More Tips And Techniques for making cloth dolls

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Here are more tips and techniques for people making their first cloth character dolls.

Stitch Length & Stuffing

Blow outs are the number 1 enemy of doll makerswe hate them! Blowouts are when you are stuffing your doll (and they have to be stuffed HARD as you will hear about soon) and suddenly the stitching gives way and you have a hole in your doll!!!!!! Knowing how most doll makers react there are usually a lot of swear words muttered or yelled when this happens.

One of the best ways to prevent these from happening is to make sure that your stitch length is as small as possiblearound 1.5-2 at most! Of course then you have the problem of impossible un picking so best to go real slowly with your machine and not make any mistakes LOL. On all cotton fabrics you will do fine with a 1.5-2 stitch length. When it comes to more evening fabrics, polyester, silks etc you will need to experiment on a piece of scrap fabric first to see how it handles the smaller stitch. Really, you should do a test with any fabric as this saves the tears later. If you are sewing Nylon Lycra or any fabric that your machine is not happy with at a small stitch length its best to make the length a little longer so it sews nicely rather than give up doll making forever.:-)

Cloth dolls need to be stuffed very well.especially at the ankles, neck, and any thin areas. Your doll needs to feel HARD! If there are any soft parts she needs more stuffing. These character dolls are stuffed till they feel like a ripe peach. Not till the seams are bursting! I say to my students stuff them till you think you are finished.then put in another handful..basically you stuff them until you cannot fit any more in but not till the seams are giving way!

Your stuffing MUST be good quality.

To test this take a piece of stuffing big enough to fit inside your hand when squeezed.

Squeeze it in your palm and then open your hand.

If the stuffing springs back out to its former size really well, then that is great stuffing. That is what you need to find!

It should also look smooth all the way through. No unexploded lumps and threads. The technique for stuffing a doll well seems to be one of the best kept secrets of doll making. It was something that drove me absolutely crazy when I first started to make dolls. I couldn’t understand why I kept getting cellulite or those lumpy bits everywhere. I was in touch by email with a very well known doll maker so asked her to help me. Her answer was to use small pieces of stuffing and that would do the trick..NOT!!! Didn’t work for me. I was making a pattern which would not normally be thought of as a beginners doll but remember, I had already had a heap of experience sewing and designing. I ended up putting the cardboard cores from toilet rolls inside the legs of this doll then carefully adding wispy strands of stuffing over the top so that the toilet rolls couldn’t be seen! What a job that was Bet you have not heard that story from anyone before !

Now, I think I am an expert stuffer, really good and I enjoy it too, find it a very soothing experience. I am a firm believer that learning to stuff well takes time and practice. But I can help with a few shortcuts.

1: You need really good white polyester stuffing! Do Not use used stuffing. In Australia, Spotlight has great stuffing ( most of the time)..every so often I get a bag that has some of this cotton wool style fluffy soft stuffing that I really don’t likebut mostly it is a slightly wiry consistency that I really like. In USA I suggest Hobby Lobby. There are tests to find out how good the stuffing is. I have shown you one of them above but you really cannot go into a shop, open all their plastic bags and test the stuffing before you buy it. I think the best way is to try a few different ones then stick to the one you like best. In Australia we are also able to get a good quality wool stuffing. I have tried this but prefer ordinary polyester. Wool is heavier though and some doll makers prefer it.

2: DO NOT take your stuffing out of the bag in small amounts and push that into your doll! Every time you have a break in the stuffing it creates an air bubble when you push all the stuffing together and that creates cellulite!!! Yes! This is what causes it! Keep the bag of stuffing beside you and feed the stuffing into the doll in a long stream! This is one of the best secrets! Of course there are times when you need to use smaller bits but mostly and as much as possible keep it in one long stream.

3: Use haemostats to stuff with. I hate those stuffing forks that are around. If you want blown seams then go ahead ..use a stuffing fork.not my choice. My haemostats are really my most precious tool. If I could only pick one, then I think that would be it!J These are usually available at doll shows or at any quilting shop that keeps supplies for doll makersand also a lot of the online doll supply shops will have them for sale. I will list a bunch of them for you later in this ebook.

Turning Corners smoothly

As you sew your doll, you will find you need to sew smooth curves. The very best way to handle this is using the needle down technique. What this means is.you sew into the curve slowly then stop with the needle down into the fabric. Lift the foot and gently move the fabric around till you can continue sewing again. Some curves you may have to do this 4 times when you are a beginner

TIP: When you are sewing around fingers you will need to get really good at that technique.

Cutting out

Take it easy when cutting out around the sewn templates. You need to cut slowly making sure you leave an even amount of seam all around. I would suggest having the seam too big rather than too small otherwise you may experience the dreaded BlowoutsJ

TIP::If you do get a blowout, re turn the body piece and resew.. If that is not viabledo another. Yes! It doesn’t take long and you are not using too much fabric. You will be MUCH happier if you redo it in the long run.

Turning

Beginners often spend a lot of time agonizing about turning and turning tools. There are many to choose from. For turning tiny fingers sewn from cotton fabrics, I would recommend the brass hollow

Tiny Turning Tubes $US8

The set includes FOUR telescoping turning tubes and one brass rod all custom milled to a satin smooth finish, enabling the doll maker to turn even the tiniest fingers perfectly. Complete directions on how to use them and additional hand making tips are included

These are available for sale from

http://www.dollmakersjourney.com

For all other turning I use my haemostats. I have a small, medium and large set and these work for everything.

Hemostats

These are also available for sale from

http://www.dollmakersjourney.com

Available in 12″, 10″ 6.25″ and 3.5″ Size.

3.5 $US4.95

6.25 $US5.95

10 $US11.95

12 $US14.95

I believe these are the only turning tools you will ever need. You don’t need to spend megabucks on tools just buy a small and med pair haemostats and one set tiny tools and you will be set. Add to this if you ever need to as you become more experienced.

For turning hands I very carefully reach inside the finger right to the end, grasp the end of the unturned finger with my haemosats, then pull gently until it starts to come towards me, then I continue the same way with all the fingers. Next I just grasp a few fingers at once and pull again

TIP: Another way to turn fingers is to use a bamboo skewer and a drinking straw. Just insert the straw inside the finger, then using the blunt end of the skewer push gently into the straw from the outside. The fabric will disappear a little way into the straw, now do the same to all the fingers then turn the hand and it’s done.

OK thats all for today. If you are following along, maybe you can practise the tips I have told you about , then you will be ready to learn more next time I blog. Have fun. LOve Di